Lessons from the Senate cash dash

Chalk up yet another fundraising victory for Democratic Senate candidates.

In the dozen most competitive contests across the country, Democrats once again collected more cash during the first three months of the year than Republicans, who are expected to wage an aggressive battle for the Senate majority.

Stabenow’s $1.5 million haul was in part due to the fallout from the controversial Superbowl ad aired by GOP opponent Pete Hoekstra, which featured a young Asian woman speaking in broken English to thank the second-term Democrat for her spending and borrowing policies.

Hoekstra’s donations dropped 30 percent over the period while Stabenow doubled him up, assembling her best quarter ever.

McCaskill, who arguably faces the toughest odds of any Democratic incumbent, piled up $2.3 million, easily blowing away her three GOP rivals combined. That marks the best first quarter number ever for a Missouri Senate candidate.

No Republican challenger in the Badger State came even within striking distance of the primary-less Baldwin’s $2 million tally.

In Nevada, Democratic Rep. Shelley Berkley’s nearly $1.4 million marked another personal best and placed her well ahead of GOP Sen. Dean Heller’s $1 million.

Two of the GOP’s top-flight female candidates — former Rep. Heather Wilson in New Mexico and former Gov. Linda Lingle in Hawaii — also turned in winning performances.

This is now the third straight quarter Warren has outraised Brown by a better than 2-to-1 margin, providing her the chance to accomplish an almost unfathomable goal for Democrats a year ago: financial parity.

Last summer, Brown sat on an almost $10 million cash-on-hand advantage. Since Warren entered the race seven months ago, the former Harvard professor has steadily shaved that lead down to $4 million.

Against most any other candidate, Brown’s $3.4 million first quarter would be categorized as a crushing figure. But Warren’s consistently proven she’s in her own orbit when it comes to collecting checks.

Over the past three quarters, she’s bested the freshman incumbent by an average of $2.5 million a period. If she’s able to keep up that frenetic pace, Warren could be nearly even with Brown by the fal — an important achievement considering the super PAC agreement that has sidelined progressive groups from parachuting into the Bay State on her behalf.

Yawn..... 23 democrat seats are up, 10 republican seats are up. And Obama has signaled the DNC won't be sharing funds for Senate and house races this year. (He needs it for himself.) In contrast the RNC will be pumping about 40 million into the house and senate races this year. I would have thought information like this would have been included in this story.